Very impressed with Mike Aviles

about Aviles to me is that he had proven he could hit in the minors, and he’s operating in the majors in the same OPS range that he had in AAA. If he continues this, he will be a very very productive hitter in the bigs. But as we have seen time and time again with our good call-ups, what makes the difference is how the hitter adjusts once the league figures him out. Aviles should start experiencing this in the coming weeks.

Watching him for a number of games now, it’s obvious Aviles can really hit. As long as he maintains a decent level of defense (approaching average), I’m excited about having him in the lineup every day. He is really hitting some ropes.

he would be doing this well. I expect him to cool off a little of course, but this is a huge improvement over Pena. He could just be the classic late bloomer. I’m good with giving him the rest of the year at short to see if he can keep up his nice numbers.

amen, brother.

Although I hope to god we’re all wrong.

Couple of things:

1) I’m not really sure his range is an issue, at least not to his left. His error last night was a throwing error that occurred after he picked a ball while running behind second base—he was already on the 1B side of the bag when he made the ill-advised spin-and-throw. Now, fair witness time; I didn’t see where he was set up to start the play, so he may have been playing close to the bag and I’m talking out my posterior. Still, it looked as though he’d gotten on his horse pretty well.

2) You know, I know, we all know exactly how many truckloads of salt to take RCAA with. But it’s pretty damned shocking, nevertheless, that as of this morning Mike Aviles is the Royals’ co-leader (with Guillen) in RCAA. (The other surprising RCAA note for the day: TPJ is no longer the worst hitter in the AL; that honor now belongs to Robinson Cano.)

3) “For the most part, he’s taking balls and swinging at strikes.” YES. I especially noticed this on his sole single of the evening; he patiently took three balls, then took an unhittable strike… then got his pitch and calmly rifled it into left field for a base hit. If that’s going to be his approach, then I’m not worried about his walk total; he’ll draw his walks, and he’ll hit his pitches.

(This is one of those things where statistics sometimes doesn’t tell the whole story, especially with small sample sizes. If Aviles continues to tear it up, he’s going to start walking more, because he’s not going to get meaty challenge pitches early in the count. I hope nobody even begins to fret about his walk total until/unless he stops actually hitting.)

And that leads into…

4) I don’t see him going Hiatt; Hiatt had no plate discipline. I don’t see him going Kingery either; Kingery didn’t really have power, and that’s what eventually ate him. Not to say he won’t turn into a pumpkin, but I don’t think it’ll happen in the same manner as those guys. ‘course, he could Chris Shelton…

.379 BABIP, and it’s for me to believe that he can sustain a number that high. Am I impressed with how well he’s done so far? Yes, good for him, good for us. Do I think there’s a great deal of regression coming before we actually know what we can expect from him going forward? Yes.

I was going to come and write a fanpost about Aviles. I was going to talk about how I’m really loving to watch this guy play and will enjoy it while it lasts. Might as well not worry about whether or not he is likely to regress, but just don’t be surprised if it happens. But baseball is a crazy game, there have been much rarer stories than a 27 year old succeeding after being in the minors for years. Maybe he can become an above average player for us? Who knows at this point.

In the meantime, Aviles is quickly becoming a fan favorite in Royals Nation (yes, I said Royals Nation). He is a guy a fan can reallly root for. Most of us root for every player, but a guy like Aviles who has worked his ass off to get up to the major leagues at a later age, is really the type of player who fans love to root for.

Let’s hope he keeps playing at a high level and like many have said….at least we don’t have to deal with TPJ anymore.

But I am concerned with his troubles with breaking balls. As a “book” develops on him, look for that to be his Achilles heel. Still, he could adjust, and some hitters have done okay abusing fastballs. If he can post a .760 OPS I can live with his sub-par defense.

And kudos to NYRoyal to be open-minded on the kid. I’ll admit too, I was pretty down on the guy, but at a certain point, I think you have to admit that you have to try anything when your shortstop has an OPS+ of -1.

When do you lock him up to a long-term deal – this week or next week?

Bo Hart

Sorry, I had to knock ya’ll back down from that cloud ya’ll came floatin’ in here on!!!!!!

I’m ecstatic that he is off to as hot of start as he is, but seriously, how many career minor leaguers pan out to long term guys?

Lew Ford? Mark Ellis?

I know there is the occasional exception where scouts look back and say, “whoops” but they are few and far between (and rarely come from a low budget organization like KC)...

As was pointed out on an earlier post, he is a guy that is easy to root for. Ala DDj, he plays the game w/ a smile on his face, but if the R’s have been projecting him as a utility player, then that is what my expectations remain as (for now). A few dozen AB’s does not a Franchise SS make.

Sorry